f the shoemaker's
wooden wand on the soles of countless slippers, the thud of the
coffee-beater's blunt club on the beans, and the groaning grunt with
which he accompanied each downward stroke mingled with the incessant
roar of camels, and seemed to be made more deafening and intolerable by
the fierce heat of the sun, and by the innumerable smells which seethed
forth upon the air. Domini felt her nerves set on edge, and was thankful
when they came once more into the narrow alleys that ran everywhere
between the brown, blind houses. In them there was shade and silence and
mystery. Mustapha strode before to show the way, Domini and Androvsky
followed, and behind glided the little mob of barefoot inquisitors in
long shirts, speechless and intent, and always hopeful of some chance
scattering of money by the wealthy travellers.

The tumult of the market-place at length died away, and Domini was
conscious of a curious, far-off murmur. At first it was so faint that
she was scarcely aware of it, and merely felt the soothing influence of
its level monotony. But as they walked on it grew deeper, stronger. It
was like the sound of countless multitudes of bees buzzing in the noon
among flowers, drowsily, ceaselessly. She stopped under a low mud arch
to listen. And when she listened, standing still, a feeling of awe
came upon her, and she knew that she had never heard such a strangely
impressive, strangely suggestive sound before.

"What is that?" she said.

She looked at Androvsky.

"I don't know, Madame. It must be people."

"But what can they be doing?"

"They are praying in the mosque where Sidi-Zerzour is buried," said
Mustapha.

Domini remembered the perfume-seller. This was the sound she had beard
in his sunken chamber, infinitely multiplied. They went on again slowly.
Mustapha had lost something of his flaring manner, and his gait was
subdued. He walked with a sort of soft caution, like a man approaching
holy ground. And Domini was moved by his sudden reverence. It was
impressive in such a fierce and greedy scoundrel. The level murmur
deepened, strengthened. All the empty and dim alleys surrounding the
unseen mosque were alive with it, as if the earth of the houses, the
palm-wood beams, the iron bars of the tiny, shuttered windows, the very
thorns of the brushwood roofs were praying ceaselessly and intently in
secret under voices. This was a world intense with prayer as a flame is
intense with heat, with prayer pene